It is known to provide the cooking areas of heating elements with a sensor system that switches the heating means off when the heating elements reach a maximum permitted temperature. Generally, use is made of a rod-type thermostat made from two different materials with different thermal expansion coefficients. As a result of heating the different materials to a predetermined temperature, two contacts are separated from each other so that the power supply to the heating device of the cooking area is interrupted. Such a rod-type thermostat is disadvantageous in that a change to the switching point requires considerable effort and that the rod-type thermostats only react slowly to temperature changes.
The problem then is to provide a temperature sensor and a radiant heater to eliminate the disadvantages of the prior art and ensure high precision, safety, and low production costs.